Beverly Byrne

by Come Sunrise

"Dreams of ancient glory," Rick said with a sigh. "It won't work, Beatriz. Those who survive and prosper will be the ones who get out of here and look to the future, not the past."

  "I know that. Only I don't want them to forget the past. I want the young ones to take it with them. What is wrong with that'?"

  "Nothing. But you have your mother to think of." He almost added, "And yourself," but he didn't say it. Beatriz needed no reminding that she was forty-six years old, and that if she meant to salvage what remained of her life, she had to quit the barrio. Neither did she need to be told that the relationship between her and Ibanez was only friendship joined to physical necessity. It could never be love, and marriage was no part of it.

  "My mother is doing very well," she told him, as if that was what he'd meant. "The medicine you gave her last week helps a great deal."

  "I'm glad," Rick said with a small smile. In her quiet way Beatriz always won. They did not speak anymore. Beatriz turned away from him and began unbuttoning her dress. It was of plain gray cotton trimmed with black braid. It was old-fashioned and dowdy; not old-fashioned and beautiful like the clothes she made and sold. Beneath the gray dress she wore a white linen camisole and petticoat. She removed those too. Her motions were calm and efficient and without shame. Rick enjoyed watching her undress. She had done it just this same way the first time, three months after Margarita's death.

  Then he had been a man in torment, living in a nightmare composed as much of guilt as of grief. He was a trained man of healing, but he had not been present when his young wife began a premature labor. Instead he'd been off in a distant pueblo treating the Indians who made him feel like God if he so much as stitched a knife wound. It took hours for the summons to reach him, and more hours for him to get back to Santa Fe. By that time Margarita was dead. There was a lot of bleeding, the old housekeeper told him, a river of blood that she and the midwife couldn't staunch. Rick forced himself to examine his dead wife. Not hemorrhage, his practiced eye said, heart failure. Digitalis might have saved her, but he hadn't been there to administer it. So the pain of loss had been overlaid with the ugly pattern of guilt. That duo of emotions had held him in a vise, until Beatriz healed him.

  One day he went to see his patient Senora Ortega and the quiet, self-effacing daughter led him to her bedroom. She had locked the door and undressed, just as she was doing now. "You need a woman, Don Rico," she'd said in her well-modulated voice. "And I need a man. I am a divorcee, not a virgin, you understand that?"

  He had nodded. He knew that her legal name was Beatriz Johnson and that she'd been married to an Anglo who took her east and eventually deserted her for a younger woman of his own culture and back-ground. After that Beatriz had returned to Santa Fe, resumed her father's name and opened her strange sad little shop. "I know," he'd said, watching with fascination the dispassionate way she removed her clothes and revealed a full, voluptuous figure. Her body did not seem to belong to her sharp-featured, gaunt face. No doubt his astonishment had showed.

  "I am much older than you," she had said, looking at him gravely. "I have no wish to entrap you, Don Rico, nor could I. I'm barren. The doctors in St. Louis proved that years ago. But my body does not displease you, I think. And my need is as great as yours." Then she had smiled, and he had seen that the full breasts and rounded hips were representative of the real Beatriz; a woman warm, passionate, and intelligent. "Come, take me," she'd said. "It will give pleasure to both of us."

  She had said the same thing every time since. She said it now. "Come, take me."

  While she watched he took off his clothes. It had become a ritual, this manner of undressing; one after the other, with each watching in turn. Ibanez saw the pleasure in her eyes and was conscious of his tall muscular frame, slim-hipped and broad-shouldered like an old time matador, and of the heavy, swollen manhood pulsing erect between his legs. He moved toward her, and she stretched out her hand and caressed his penis lovingly. Then she dropped to her knees and enfolded it in her breasts before taking it in her mouth. Sometimes she finished him like that, and afterward he would satisfy her in the same way. This time she pulled her head away after a moment, and went and lay on the bed, legs spread and arms outstretched. "Come, take me," she repeated.

  Afterward he felt a strange sadness that was not like all the other times. In the past he had been grateful to her. He admired her wisdom and uncompromising integrity. "I am not a whore, and you are neither a murderer nor a hero," she'd said after the first time. "We are human beings, with needs and weaknesses, and little bits of virtue that we exercise for mixed motives. We must learn to be gentle and forgiving with ourselves."

  He'd never forgotten those words, or the way they had eased his pain. So tonight Ibanez was a little ashamed. He wasn't living up to the truthfulness that had marked their alliance thus far. This time he had lain over Beatriz with the shadow of another woman between them, more real than the ghost of Margarita had ever been.

  As if she read his thoughts Beatriz said, "I am told that the young wife of the Anglo who has bought Santo Domingo is your patient. Is she a nice person?"

  He reached over and found a cigarette on the table by the bed. Lighting it gave him a moment to collect his thoughts. "Why do you ask?" he said between puffs of smoke.

  "My cousin Manuel owns the ranch adjoining Santo Domingo. It was his father's and his grandfather's before him."

  "I know that," Ibanez said. He was sorry about the impatience in his voice. "What are you getting at, Beatriz?" he asked with more gentleness.

  "Mr. Westerman," she would not dignify an Anglo with the title of don or senor, "is threatening to refuse Manuel the right to water his cattle."

  "I don't understand."

  "The waterhole on Santo Domingo is the only one for many miles. Always it has been shared by my cousin and another ranch to the south."

  "Then it will probably go on like that. Don't worry, Westerman's a newcomer. He doesn't yet know our ways. He'll learn."

  "The arrangement is by private treaty," she insisted. "It is not written into the deeds. And my cousin Manuel says Mr. Westerman is a strange man. Very hard. Perhaps he does not want to know our ways." Then, anticipating his next question: "I thought you might speak to the wife and find out her husband's intentions. I would not ask you, Don Rico, except that Manuel has seven children and ranching is the only thing he knows. Besides, that land is part of him. It would kill him to lose his ranch."

  Ibanez rose and pulled on his clothes. This was the first time Beatriz had ever asked him for anything more than physical pleasure. And it was not for her-self but for her cousin. Still it signaled a change. Coupled with his sad unfulfilled feeling it convinced him that the relationship with Beatriz was nearing its end. He would not come many more times to this warm dark room in the barrio.

  "If the opportunity arises, I will see what I can find out," he said.

  "Good night, Beatriz."

  "Goodnight, Don Rico. And thank you."

  He was too restless and disturbed to go home, so he wandered the streets instead. The only sound came from Dona Zia's whorehouse near the creek. Ibanez stood looking at it for a few minutes. The windows were not shuttered. Yellow light spilled from them into the narrow dirt road. He could see the shadows of men and women behind the lace curtains, and hear the sound of a tinny piano mingled with slightly drunken laughter.

  Dona Zia's establishment was an accepted part of the town. It wasn't shrouded in shame or secrecy. Her girls were clean-Rick was not their doctor, but he knew that to be true-and her business was part of a long tradition that began with the fabled gaming house of Dona Tules in the last century.

  In the days when Santa Fe was the center of the Spanish crown's Kingdom of New Mexico, an area that included what was now Nevada and Arizona, Dona Tules provided men with amusement and relief. After General Kearney's Army of the West arrived in 1846, and annexed the city and the surrounding territory to the United States, there had been similar houses run by like-minded women. Dona
Zia was merely the latest link in a long chain. She was a much more conventional woman than Beatriz Ortega.

  Ibanez sighed. If he ended his liaison with Beatriz, sooner or later he would make his way there to that house. The demands of that appendage between his legs would insure it, whatever he thought. It was unlikely that he would find again an alliance like the one in the barrio. He was not a user of women. The physical release he needed must be paid for somehow. Either with shared need, as it had been with Beatriz, or with money. He had a certain distaste for the latter, but that was foolish. Just as foolish as standing there in the dark thinking about history. He started on the long walk home. He'd get little sleep that night, and tomorrow there would be an office full of patients as usual.

  While he walked it occurred to Rick that he'd left something out of the question he'd been pondering. What about love? Wasn't that the best underpinning of a relationship between a man and a woman? Not for me, he thought. He had loved Margarita, whose childlike innocence and simplicity had delighted him. She was dead and he doubted that such a girl would ever again attract him. He was older and wiser and he wanted different things. As for Amy, that was madness. She was another man's wife. To Tommy Westerman belonged her gaminlike beauty, the intensity of feeling that spilled from her dark eyes, and her quick-silver laugh. "I hope to hell he appreciates them," Ibanez muttered into the night.

  The Westermans' bedroom was high in the corner of the house that boasted a second story. One window opened onto a small balcony overlooking the patio and was curtained by the branches of the gum tree. Amy had pruned them to let in light and air. Now when she stepped out it was as if she were standing in the very heart of the tree. If Tommy was away with the range crew, she went to the balcony each morning at dawn, and remembered the gum's brief season of bloom. She watched the sunrise, and imagined that she could yet see the tree afire.

  By early June she thought she was pregnant again. She had suspected as much for some time, and she drove into Santa Fe to see if Rick would confirm it.

  "Yes," he told her after a simple examination. "I'm fairly certain. About three months perhaps."

  "I thought so."

  He cocked his head and studied her. "It's very soon after Kate. You're looking pale. I wish you had waited."

  She studied her hands and twisted her wedding ring. "Tommy wants more children."

  Rick gave her a tonic she was to take regularly, and made no further comment. They left the office together, and Amy was surprised to see the waiting room empty.

  "What's happened? An epidemic of good health?"

  "I wish it was," he chuckled. "No, I go to see my daughter on Thursday afternoons. My patients know that. "

  He walked with her to the courtyard. His car, a Pierce-Arrow, was being repaired. Rick remarked that today he'd have to ride horseback to the convent.

  "I have Tommy's flivver," Amy said quickly. "He's away and Kate's with Maria. I can give you a lift. Unless you'd rather see your daughter alone."

  "No, I would love you to meet her. I'm delighted." Even as he spoke Rick cursed himself for a fool. Inviting Amy into the private parts of his life was folly. He knew it, but he was nonetheless grateful for the pleasure of the moment.

  He took the wheel and they drove west into the foothills. Finally they came to a small walled convent nestled amid towering spruce trees and topped by a belltower and a cross. "It's a different world up here," Amy said.

  "Yes, New Mexico is a place of many contrasts."

  Inside they were greeted by soft-voiced, sweet-faced nuns. robed not in black, as Amy expected, but in dark brown. "We call them las Carmelitas," Rick explained. "Officially, the Carmelite Sisters of Divine Hope. They came from Spain about fifty years ago."

  They were shown into a stiff little parlor, with hard-backed chairs and a large wooden crucifix as its only adornment, and Estella was brought to them.

  Amy thought it an austere setting for a four-year-old, but the little girl seemed happy enough. She was, however, sniffling and feverish, and Rick diagnosed the onset of grippe. He gave her some medicine and decreed that she must be put to bed. A shy young nun, with the face of an angel and an accent that indicated her recent arrival from Madrid, gathered the little girl into her arms and lisped small comforting words in the ancient tongue.

  "Thank you, Sister Angelina," Rick said. "I will return in a day or two to see how she is." The nun dropped a graceful old-world curtsy and carried the child away.

  Outside Amy said, "You're sure she's better off here than home with you and a housekeeper?"

  "I'm sure," he said. "Life cannot be kind for a motherless child, but las Carmelitas are much better than any housekeeper I could provide. My wife would prefer it like this, I think."

  "Did you love her very much?" Amy asked softly. Then, "Forgive me, that's an impertinent question."

  "Don't apologize, the pain is an old one. I've learned to live with it. And yes, I loved her very much."

  They stood for a moment looking at the mountains. I am replacing old griefs with new ones, Rick thought as they got into the car. Still he asked, "What are you doing tomorrow?"

  "Nothing unusual," Amy said.

  "It's a holiday, June thirteenth, San Antonio day. I won't have any patients." He looked at her with a trace of shyness. "I wonder if you would come on an excursion with me."

  Amy's smile lit her face. Being with Rick was one of the nicest things she knew. It didn't occur to her that her reaction might not be proper for a married lady. She had too much unhappiness in her life to question small allotments of joy. "I'd love to," she said. "Where will we go?"

  "I'll tell you tomorrow. I want it to be a surprise." His smile was as warm as her own, and his dark eyes danced with pleasure. "We'll have to leave very early. I'll be at your place an hour after sunup. We won't get back until late. Will Kate be all right?"

  "Maria is marvelous with her. She'll be fine without me for one day."

  The feast day dawned bright and sunny. Amy waited for Rick by the gate. He drove up in the repaired Pierce-Arrow and jumped out to help her in. "What's this?" he asked, spying the hamper by her feet.

  "A picnic. You said we'd be gone all day."

  "Marvelous! I never thought about what we'd eat."

  "And drink," she said, indicating a bottle of red wine.

  They drove west on deserted dirt roads that cut across a broad and featureless plateau. The morning was still, not yet too hot, and full of promise. Contentedly they shared silence. At one point they stopped at a small roadside restaurant for an early lunch. "We can save our picnic for later," Rick said.

  They ate quickly, then resumed their journey. At length they came to a landscape of crags and scarps tumbling into a wide valley. "This is Chaco Canyon," Rick told her. "And what you see are the deserted pueblos of the Anasazi, descendents of the earliest people in this corner of the world. You may have heard them referred to as Basketmakers."

  Amy stared around her in astonishment. It was early afternoon. The air was clear and brittle, and the sun rode high over fantastic cliff dwellings scattered across a dark. stony landscape. Rick stopped the car near one free-standing cluster of buildings. "Pueblo Bonito," he said. "Come."

  The pueblo was built of neat sandstone slabs, laid with precision and an artist's eye. It rose many feet into the sky and had its back to a cliff, but did not lean against it. Access to the upper floors was by ladders. Some looked new and safe, others as if a touch would cause them to fall to dust. "Archeologists are working to restore it," Rick said. "They've been at it since 1896."

  "It must be a formidable undertaking," she said softly. "It's huge."

  "They say in its heyday Pueblo Bonito housed twelve hundred people in eight hundred rooms and covered close to three acres."

  She arched her neck and twisted her head to look at the great semicircle of prodigious effort surrounding them. "When did they build it?" she asked. "And where have they gone?"

  "It probably was started around the
year 750, and reached its peak soon after 1200. As to where the builders went"-he shrugged-"that is New Mexico's greatest mystery. The Basketmakers achieved all this, and suddenly, for no reason we can discover, they packed their things and left. There is no evidence of fighting or destruction, no mass burials to signify an outbreak of plague or disease. There is only what you see. "

  They walked through small square rooms with hard-packed earthen floors and simple rectangular doors looking out to the courtyard and the dazzling sun. In some places the restoration was incomplete and the skeleton of the pueblo showed. It was constructed of pine timbers topped with peeled branches and split bark. The covering of earth that finished each floor was four inches thick. The whole layered assembly provided the ceiling of the room below.

  "They've had to stop work here now," Rick said. "The war."

  "But they'll continue when the war is over, won't they?" It pained her to think of this magnificence left to fall once more to ruin.

  "I hope so. I dream that one day many people will come to Chaco Canyon. America can never be strong unless it understands all the different roots that make up the whole." He grinned and looked a bit embarrassed. "It's getting late, past time for philosophy. The kiva will have to wait for next time."